Banco Master scandal drives Brazil’s top court crisis
The Brazilian Supreme Court has been thrust into what experts told the Guardian represents the greatest crisis the institution has faced since Brazil’s return to democracy in the 1980s, after Justices Alexandre de Moraes and André Mendonça traded personal insults and accusations during a hearing in Brasília on Tuesday that was livestreamed into millions of Brazilian homes.
The session was convened to decide whether an investigation should be opened into Moraes’s conduct. According to the Guardian, Moraes accused Mendonça of being “at the service of a political group that tried to launch a coup in this country!” Mendonça, who the Guardian describes as the only openly evangelical member of the 11-seat court and a Presbyterian pastor, replied: “It’s a lie!”
Within minutes, Justice Gilmar Mendes accused Mendonça of weaponizing the court’s work to cause political chaos and influence October’s presidential election. Mendonça responded: “Don’t point your finger at me, Minister Gilmar! Don’t point your finger! You’re not talking to any old person! Show some respect to this court!” Mendes shot back: “Respect is earned, not given.”
The courtroom confrontation reflects the broader electoral battle, with the Guardian describing the drama as “in many ways a proxy for the electoral battle between the leftwing president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and his far-right rival, Flávio Bolsonaro.” The two are likely to face a second-round runoff on October 25.
The Guardian describes Moraes as “a pugnacious shaven-headed martial arts practitioner” and reports that he was appointed almost a decade ago by then-President Michel Temer — whom the paper described as “rightwing” — but the 57-year-old justice has become widely associated with Lula through his successful prosecution of former president Jair Bolsonaro over the events following the 2022 election, which the Guardian called “a botched coup.” Bolsonaro was convicted in connection with those events and is serving a 27-year sentence.
Mendonça was appointed during Jair Bolsonaro’s 2018-23 presidency. The Guardian attributes to “leftwingers” the view that Mendonça is “a stooge” for the former president.
As the October election approaches, the confrontation has coincided with the sprawling Banco Master banking scandal — Brazil’s biggest-ever — which has snowballed into a wider judicial and political crisis.
The Banco Master scandal began last November when the bank’s owner, Daniel Vorcaro, was arrested by federal police as he prepared to board a private jet from São Paulo to Malta. The Guardian describes Vorcaro as the “playboy owner” of the collapsed bank. Investigations uncovered apparent links between Vorcaro and figures across Brazil’s political and judicial elite, foremost among them Flávio Bolsonaro and Moraes. Other members of the supreme court and their relatives have also been linked to Vorcaro.
Mendonça has been accused of fast-tracking the investigation into Moraes while stalling the inquiry into Vorcaro’s reported ties to the Bolsonaros and the banker’s reported bankrolling of a film about former president Jair Bolsonaro.
Earlier this month, Mendonça unsealed a police dossier related to the Banco Master investigation that contained WhatsApp exchanges apparently between Vorcaro and Moraes, as well as a copy of a $25 million contract between Banco Master and the law firm of Moraes’s wife. In one text message, sent two days before his arrest, Vorcaro asked Moraes: “Do you think … I need to get out [of the country]?”
Moraes rejected the allegations on the eve of Tuesday’s hearing, claiming he was being smeared with politically-motivated “criminal lies” as part of a revenge attack by the rightwing forces behind the coup attempt that culminated in the January 2023 riots in Brasília. Moraes also alleged that the attacks on him involved “external actors” and were part of a possible foreign attempt to interfere in Brazil’s election.
The hearing reached its crescendo on Tuesday as supreme court judges convened in Brasília to decide whether to open an investigation into Moraes’s conduct. The Guardian also reports that Moraes has demanded an investigation into Mendonça.
Constitutional law professor Eloísa Machado, who follows the supreme court, told the Guardian the timing could hardly be worse. “The timing is awful. We are just a few weeks away from elections that already look to be challenging for a democracy that has been struggling to deal with extremist and anti-democratic groups that continue to be an important political force in the country. So I think we have a perfect storm here,” Machado said.
Machado said Lula had “absolutely nothing to do” with the scandal engulfing Moraes and the supreme court, noting that Lula did not appoint the justice. Even so, the crisis looks likely to hurt Lula’s chances of winning a fourth term, given the widespread public association between him and Moraes because of the judge’s role in Jair Bolsonaro’s conviction.
In a social media video posted as Tuesday’s hearing played out, Flávio Bolsonaro blamed the judicial scandal on Lula’s administration but made no mention of his own alleged ties to Vorcaro. “This [is happening] because the current government … is part of this decaying system and we are now seeing this rotten system reveal itself before the eyes of the entire nation,” Bolsonaro said, claiming Lula had “shared power” with Moraes.
Political analyst Thomas Traumann told the Guardian the scandal would accelerate the campaign’s descent into a back-and-forth of mudslinging, as both sides battled to convince voters of their rival’s sins. “This campaign is going to get dirtier much faster than we had expected,” Traumann said.